


SOMA: After the Launch

by TheFallTaurus



Category: SOMA (Video Game)
Genre: Adventure, Developing Relationship, Gen, Loneliness, Loss, SoMa - Freeform, Travel, happiness, hopelessness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-23
Updated: 2020-05-28
Packaged: 2020-07-11 20:45:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 17,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19934230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFallTaurus/pseuds/TheFallTaurus
Summary: Not long after the ARK launched and he was alone again. Simon was truly alone. Catherine was gone when the Omnitool overloaded. He'll do anything to get her back, he can't be alone again. He can't lose her like Ashely. Now that their mission is over, it's just them it was supposed to be. It can't just be him. He doesn't want it to be.





	1. Are You There?

**Chapter One "Are You There?"**

Simon stared at the broken screen. He kept saying her name, over and over again, even an hour of being trapped in the chair. "Catherine? Catherine? Catherine? Are you there? Please don't leave me alone."

He heard nothing. Just the screen displaying the same message.

Then, he looked down at his hand to see that he was holding the Omnitool. When did he take it out? It was a bit fried on the outside, hopefully the inside was safe. That Catherine was safe. He couldn't be alone; he didn't want to be. The screen kept displaying the same message, over and over. Even after he took out the Omnitool it kept saying the message.

CRITICAL FAILURE

Error EXT_READCTX570: Cortex Chip corrupted.

Please retry.

Was it corrupted? Was Catherine gone? He had pried himself out of the chair, not something the original him could do. Then again, he was over 100 years into the future at the bottom of the ocean in a dive suit with another copy of himself still asleep. That Simon couldn't do that, that one would have thought this just a dream and gone out to a bar with Ashley...Yeah, that Simon lived a good life. He didn't deserve to have died of his injury, nor did Ashley, he deserved to have lived to the age of 80 and died happy. But he didn't. Ashley was gone. That Simon died with broken hope that things would have gotten better. Here was his copy, eternally stuck in the ocean.

The ARK had been launched. Its Simon and Catherine were living in Paradise while he was down in Perdition. Hell on earth, maybe that Leviathan would eventually swallow him up like it did for Ross. Maybe he would be able to make it back to Omicron, or Theta, or Lambda, or even Tau. Any place other than here, he couldn't stand Phi anymore. He couldn't stop thinking about Catherine.

Never until this point has he thought so much more about her. Up until now she was just there like it was the normal day to day thing; normally when she was gone she'd always be back not long after going quiet yet now she could be gone for good. He can't let her go. Not like Ashley. He had to find a way to get her back. But the Omnitool was fried and he didn't have the skills to fix it, if Catherine were here maybe she could have walked him through it but she wasn't. If the WAU was what brought him here maybe he could get it to fix her? It wasn't like it owned him one like Jesse. What choice did he have? What options rather than sitting here staring at the Omega Space Gun.

"Hang on Catherine, please still be there. I can't be alone. I'm going to make things better." Simon slowly made his way down the stairs, through the mostly depowered Site Phi, and he stood at the exit with the Omnitool at his hip. Before he left, he found a sharpie along with a clipboard of blank paper and outlined an apology. There was a air-tight backpack that the original Ark Crew used to carry their supplies in their attempt to launch it. He saw a name printed on the front, behind some ducktape covering the name like someone tried hiding it away. He peeled back a small bit to see the name Chun. Inside he found a small logbook full of notes on the ARK, her stresses with Mark Sarang's little cult, and the days they spent heading down to Phi.

One of the computers was still active, one of the tabs was a Power Suit Tracker. It showed him here at Phi, Jin Yoshida over at Tau who'd be the only challenge to get past if he decided to head back up, one was at Omicron, and another was...at Omega? Someone was up there?

Nevertheless, he marched on to the WAU, keeping Catherine close.

"WAU!" he cried out as the door began to open. "I'M COMING FOR YOU!" With a renewed mission, he stormed off into the Abyss' storm that awaited him following the lights that still laid out the path back. The Leviathan swam back and forth in the darkness, the body of many faced created by the WAU in its mission to preserve Humanity only added dread to them. Its red light emitting from the mouth let Simon know where it was and how close it was getting, it was almost like the thing was following him. Moments before the launch, it had been trying to swallow him up and forced him to hide within the small caves. He still did so, waiting a few moments for it to pass over before he doubled back on his initial route.

When he came to the old pipeline leading into Alpha, he looked back at Phi, back at the Omega Space Gun, and he felt pride in the launch yet it was overshadowed by the loneliness. The knowledge that no one would greet him when he linked up at a terminal saddened him. Yet he pushed on.

He found the WAU waiting there, it pulsated as he approached like it was acknowledging his presence. As one of its creations or just as a being before it. Johan Ross stood before it once, when he tried forcing Simon to infect the WAU when he wouldn't then the Leviathan killed him. Or at least he hoped. The A.I. brought him back once but would it do it again knowing Ross' intentions? It let Simon go even after he came here.

"WAU? Can you hear me? This is stupid but here goes nothing." He ejected Catherine's chip from the Omnitool and showed it to the WAU. "I need you to fix this! Fix! You made her and I need you to fix her! "

Nothing.

"WAU!"

Nothing.

"YOU OWE ME! YOU CREATED ME AND I SAVED YOU!"

Nothing yet again. Simon's hope began to plummet into despair. He waited and waited, time was slow then compared now. Was it an hour? Two hours? Five? He couldn't tell, he hasn't been able since he woke up. Even Catherine didn't know when he asked. Maybe it's been two days, three, or barely even that. He wasn't great at keeping time back in Toronto and certainly didn't improve since.

The trip was a waste. He looked at his options:

Tau was overgrown with the WAU, they had living quarters safe away from the monster, but above those was the clinic with Sarah Lindwall. The last human on Earth resting not far from him. Now he wished he kept her alive just to have someone around. No, that was selfish. Sarah deserved to sleep after all she did for the ARK, keeping it safe all this time.

Phi was closer, cleaner than the rest of what he's seen so far. There were still sections he hasn't dug up yet. But that's where Catherine's body was, the original one. That's where the Omega Space Gun was. He'd rather not be back there again.

Then, he saw visions. Someone climbing the Space Gun all the way to the surface, a small platform with someone in a Powersuit lying in a chair, there was a vile of Structure Gel in a container in what looked like Ross' room, and a cortex chip amidst the wreck of the Light Drone Simon tried using on his way here lying somewhere in the Abyss in what looked to be Tau perhaps? The last two images he saw where of the Powersuit Room in Tau and Omicron. Jin or...Simon Two.

Simon turned back to the WAU, he wasn't sure whether to thank it just yet. "Thanks…" was all he could manage. He started his trek back to Phi, as much as he hated every bit of it.


	2. "The Search for the Drone"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Simon, now with the knowledge of how to fix Catherine, begins his search by looking for the Light Drone the Leviathan snatched when he was on his way to Tau back at Glasser's outpost. He doubts that things will get easier from here as he ventures back to the Site to search for where the Drone crashed.

**Chapter Two "The Search For the Drone"**

Simon looked at his check-list:

  * Light Drone (at Tau?)
  * Omega Space Gun Climb (Do last)
  * Structure Gel Vile (Ross?)
  * Power Suit Room(Jin or Simon 2)



"Hey Catherine, what do-" he stopped himself. "What would Catherine do? What would she do? He sat down in the chair at Phi's control room; looking down at the Omnitool he could reminisce on the times she would tell him what to do and how to. He had to think like her, not try to match her in smarts or neurological sciency stuff, Simon used her logic.

Going through some old secretary room he found a board, some pins, and sticky notes. He wrote down his list and set it up alongside with dangers and other notes on what was also in the same places. Simon thought back to every conversation they had where Catherine was explaining.

_You want to go upstairs to the comms center. It's the room with the domed ceiling._

_Take a look at the engine room and see if you can figure it out. Maybe there's an override or something._

_No, no, it's not like that. The A.I. isn't a persona, it doesn't feel or think like we do. It's more like...it's more like a cancer._

_Take the stun baton from the box I opened and hunt down a robot with a working tool chip._

_We don't have to worry though, because with the DUNBAT the ARK could have been in the Mariana Trench-it will hold for anything._

_Ok, your new body most likely has senses similar to those you had as a human. And your mind, only knowing one way to perceive the world, superimposes that skill set on top of your new features._

Catherine always knew how to make things make...actual sense. Like the WAU not being as personified as her or him. And the ARK transfers...he just wanted to be out of this hell so bad he only half-listened to her, never trying to understand it completely until the end. Then she was gone and here he is now. What would Catherine say about this? Simon took a deep breath, closed his "eyes" and pictured everything. How this would go if she was here.

_Simon rolled the board over so Catherine could see it from the monitor. "If we're going to get you a body this is what we'll need," he told her. "Think of it as my, happy birthday to you, I just don't know which to get first."_

_Catherine, if she could, would be smiling at this. "Simon, I told you that you didn't have to. I can do without a body." From her screen she saw him just staring at her, although he had a blacked out helmet she managed to see his face. She told him that perception was everything, and thanks to Dr. Munshi's records she saw what he looked like, so she saw the Simon Jarrett of Toronto that she heard so much about. If she was going to be stuck for all of eternity_

_down here, she better get to know her only companion._

_"Nope. If we ever do try and leave this place and head back up, I don't think there's any terminals up there that work. I'm going to need you with me every moment."_

_"Aw, that's sweet of you. I'm sure that you'll regret it when I talk your ear off."_

_"We're friends. You can't ever do that."_

_Catherine was silent for a moment. He called her a friend. She never had any among Pathos-II, there was Strasky and Reed but they were probably being nice just to get on the ARK. Just when it was about the ARK or when people kept killing themselves over her project. Now here was Simon, not a scientist or anything but that Guy from Toronto, who called her a friend. If she could blush she would and her insides would butterfly._

_"Friends forever."_

_"Always."_

_She took a look at the board, examining everything he had written down for each one. "The Omega Space gun would take too long to climb up and back down for, plus you would be carrying the Power Suit down with you and those aren't exactly light. Balance is key, it's like climbing a mountain except that the fall isn't quick. It's also more painful._

_Tau's possibly has the other things on our list: the Power Suit Room, the Structure Gel, and the Cortex Chip if we're right in that it's even there. It's not without its risks. There's still Jin roaming around where we'd have to link it up and the process can draw attention. Finding the chip from the drone may have you crawl through the WAU infested parts of the place and most of the cameras are down._

_Hmm…_

_Head to Tau, find that cortex chip, it's almost as important as the Power Suit but drones aren't easy to find down here, especially the ones we need. Find a room called "K-23", I think it was some kind of experimenting room or an infirmary. There should be a vent somewhere, crawl through that and begin your search there."_

_Simon smiled and shook his head. "Catherine," he spoke, softly and out of his comfort zone, "I...Catherine I…"_

_"Yes, Simon?"_

He shot awake. "No time to waste. Tau, here I come." So he went out into the Abyss once more, retracing every step that led him from here back to Tau, although he had to do more work to reach the entrance. The area was dark, despite last he checked it was around 12 p.m. yet it did not show. He remembered the talk he and Catherine had on the long way down from the Power Climber. She told him about how should would go to the roof of where she lived to watch the world go by. When he heard that story, he didn't think that they were going to repeat it but in the back of his mind he had the thought of it in-case the ARK didn't work out. Here they are now.

Simon found the room that Catherine suggested when he thought about her, indeed there was a vent in this experimenting room. Inside the test chambers there was the Structure Gel leaking into the drain, there were dead fish reanimated by the WAU still flipping out. He wondered if the WAU reached the surface, what it would do with the bodies still there, with what's left of them. Could it still bring them back? Would it do that, finding a body and restoring its mind again? Catherine might have explained it to him how it does it but still, could it?

Climbing through the vent reminded him of Upsilon and Theta, a monster lurking below him. The Construct then Akers, and now Jin Yoshida. Often he would watch the infected Power Suit follow his echo, the tendrils twirling and shooting out when it believed to have found a poor soul. He must have been one of the last to go since the records he found didn't make any mention of his infection. One last desperate escape to the surface? To Omicron?

The vent was a straightforward, dropping down into a section he hadn't seen before. It must have been one of the rooms the WAU blockaded. It was full of Omnitools, tools, boxes and crates of supplies and other things Tau must have needed. Then there was a window showing another room. It was strange...the style and architecture was entirely different. It was almost not mechanical at all. In the center sat the Light Drone, Cortex Chip completely out in the open, almost illuminated. On the right of the window, there was a door of the same design. "Almost too easy."

How could it be a trap? The WAU doesn't have the power to make room sentient and kill him? Does it? He didn't want to waste anymore time debating and running the risks, everything would be worth it. So Simon went for it.

He carefully stepped inside the room, every step there was a CH followed by a VRIK when he took another step forward. The Light Drone looked over at him, staring directly at him. The vocal box spoke to him: _T-t-trap...trap….TRAP...TRAP! GYAHHHHHHH!_

The room began to close in until something wrapped itself around Simon's foot! He was flung up, his head struck the ceiling. His vision began to bug out, he could see the room start to break apart to reveal the jaw of a whale malformed by the WAU, with a burst of energy he charged, snatching the chip and making it back into the room as the Structure Gel began to fix the hole. With only a small foot of water leaked in, Simon set it on the table before resting against the wall, just taking a quick nap, he promises...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I thank you all for your support in this project! I haven't written any Fanfiction in a long time so this being my first one after a while and it doing well makes me soooooooo happy!


	3. "Ashley"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He woke up back in Toronto, after a successful recovery from the brain damage Dr. Munshi's brain-scan had allowed them to be able to fix. Ashley was alive, it was all a terrible nightmare, life was nearly taken from him then and it has become all the more precious now. No time like the now to do what you dream of before you never get to step a single foot forward.

**Chapter Three “Ashley”**

“Siiiiiiimon. SIIIIIIIIIMOOOOOOON. Simon!” 

His eyes opened up to see Ashley sitting on the other side of his couch. 

“Wakey, wakey, sleepy-head.”

“W-Where am I? Am I dreaming again?” 

“I don’t know, Simon, the last time you had a dream you apparently were lost at the bottom of the ocean with no one but a cellphone I think?”

“It was like that but with limited functions.”

“So Jesse?”

They both laughed, Jesse was a good guy and all but he didn’t have the best sense of direction and memory. Despite three emails, he still forgot Simon had taken the day off once and that Ashley was out of town. They took him out to get that stress off his back, he worked the entire day with barely a break. 

“Simon,” Ashley asked, “Where do you want to eat tonight? It’s our anniversary and all. Don’t tell me you forgot.”

Simon rolled off the couch, hitting the floor with a  _ THUNK _ . Yep, it was definitely real. Now he’d have to clean up the blood from his forehead again, when he just got used to it being gone was it...gone. He checked his forehead and found not a single trail of blood. Just a bowl of Ruffles now everywhere.  _ That _ he would have to clean up. 

“Are you okay Simon? Dr. Munshi said there might be some side-effects, are you listening to me?”

He raised up his hand with a thumbs up then got himself up off the ground. His apartment was cleaner than the last time he remembered things clearly, at least now he had take-out salad instead of the junk food he had. He had cards pinned up by magnets on his fridge congratulating him on the recovery as well as one from Dr. Munshi for allowing his scan to be used as a template. Now he was a bigshot among the science community, making more scans and helping more people get through what would have killed them. What would have killed Simon. 

“Let’s go to High Park, like we used to when we were in high school. I still have the red blanket and everything,” Simon told her, leaning against his sink, trying to act smooth. His hand slipped, making him stumble a little bit. At least he tried. 

Ashley giggled. “Ok, ok, Simon, but I get to drive. You still haven’t fully recovered from the scan, we can’t lose you just after we saved you.” She got up from the couch, before she walked past the couch she turned back and pulled something out from under it. She handed it to him, gift wrapped with a tag that said: HAPPY ANNIVERSARY, BRAIN-SCAN! 

He opened it up to find a tiny little brain necklace, on both sides there were plates that read “100% Working” on one side and on the other “Chasing Dreams”. He loved it, he loved her, the gift nearly brought him to complete tears. Ever since the scan, he’s had a list of everything he wanted to do when he got better. Goals he never thought to accomplish ever before in his life until he knew how easily it could have been taken away. Before he thought that he would have time, then time became limited, how easy is it for someone to have so many dreams just to be killed before they ever step foot in its direction. How many have died with hopes for a tomorrow they would see? Driving back home, thinking about the events they have tomorrow or the people they’ll see to only be snatched away because of life, because of someone’s mistake. Wrong place, wrong time. Simply tripping over their own feet to kiss death as their head bleeds out? 

Simon put those thoughts aside. His time was now and he won’t waste it. He tossed Ashley the keys to his car, a gift his Mother had gotten him after his last one was wrecked in the accident. Of course they would have to stop to get some things. He didn’t mind that, he didn’t mind that at all. He was happy, happier than learning that his death had been averted on that fateful day he had considered taking a way out. He might have done it, might not. Maybe he would have been found and saved. 

During their drive, they had talked about their plans for the year. Ashley reminding him that he promised to uphold his list as well as help her make her own. He had inspired her to do more than what she believed she could; nothing in this life is impossible to do at the moment you decide to take the plunge when you stand before it. She had wanted to climb a mountain or go rock-climbing. Simon had heard all about it from her since he did talk her ear off when he made his list. 

Suddenly, she turned off the radio and asked Simon a question. 

“Who’s Catherine?”

He arched an eyebrow. “What?”

“Catherine. Whenever you dream, you start talking out loud. I started listening from time to time, piecing together what weird mind you got going. Overtime I noticed you said a name more and more often, telling them things you haven’t told me. Talking about topics I didn’t even know you thought about. Who is she?”

He thought for a moment, what way to put it that made sense, how could he explain everything he saw down there? What he knew of the future and the living nightmare that he experienced almost all on his own. But he had Catherine, who guided him through the tough times. 

“She’s...she’s my friend. My nightmares are a living hell, I feel like I’m trapped there forever with no one out or escape in sight. Monsters around every corner, and if I tried to die something would just bring me back to life but worse. Then I met Catherine, the only person that didn’t want to kill me, or was insane, or wasn’t real. She was there, she was with me as we delved into the deep. She kept me going, whenever I broke down she picked me up, told me how things happened and what we can learn. We got close, how could we not? It’s just us after the world has ended. Hell was bearable with her around. Hell was worth staying in with her around. Then...she was gone. It was my fault and I couldn’t hear her anymore.”

Ashley was quiet. “That’s...deep Simon. I’m sorry you have to deal with those nightmares. I’m sure that paradise with come around the corner soon. I promise you.”

Under his breath, as he looked out the window at the parking lot in the distance, he muttered, “He’s living it alright.”

The picnic went exactly the way he wanted it, the sun was in the right place, the weather was fair, the wind kind, and the things inside him worked just as they should. On their walk back, he stopped and looked at her with a dumb smile on his face as the fluttering inside his stomach jolted to life again. “Ashley,” he started.

“Yes, Simon?”

His eyes began to look past her, at someone standing in the distance, someone familiar. A pitter-patter turned to a loud ping-panging as the words nearly became a toxin hard to breathe yet he pushed through when he saw her face. He had only seen it one way and now he saw it as real as daylight. One version of him had seen it when their mission was completed, when the paradise became real. When Humanity was saved from the death that lurked at the bottom of the ocean. He looked at the face of his dear Catherine Chun, and the words he nearly withheld came out.

“I love you.”

Simon woke up. He was alone again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Golly gee this was one of the most depressing chapters to write! Mainly because of Simon's dialogue about life easily being taken away before we get to fulfill our dream and goals. It hits hard at home for me because of experiences that have nearly done that to me. Two similar to Simon's case that would have killed me or left me with injuries that would have done so, by my hand out of depression for being unable to create or by the wound itself that left me to suffer before putting me asunder.


	4. "The Gel and the Devil"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On his way to recover the Structure Gel from his vision, Simon uncovers a trail originating from where the Leviathan killed Ross. As he heads back to Tau, he notices the trail leads there as well and grows suspicious if he died at all or something worse has crawled out of the depths.

**Chapter Four “The Gel and the Devil”**

Simon set down the Cortex Chip on the table at Phi, he unloaded everything he managed to scrounge up from that room in-case he would need them. Why not be prepared for anything? Unless he lost his sanity before he made it to the other side. How long would it take it for him to start hallucinating? He guessed it depended on the mental stability of the person, if they were quite sane then it would take years but if they weren’t then goodbye sanity. 

“Gotta keep it together, Simon,” he told himself out loud. “Do it for Catherine. Keep it together! Don’t stop. Keep going, keeeeeeep going, don’t stop, keep going.” He turned back to his board. Crossing out the Cortex Chip he looked at the Structure Gel supposedly in Johan Ross’ room back in Tau. He had flashbacks to when Ross would follow him and stalk him whilst he roamed around the site, urging him onwards whenever Simon stopped to take a break. He never went upstairs to Sarah, either he didn’t want to look upon her or he didn’t even know she existed at all. 

“You have to stop it!” he would shout.

Simon wasn’t interested in his goals and ambitions, the world was gone! What was the point of stopping the WAU? Let it have the Earth, let it have everything. All that mattered to him was what  _ good _ it brought him. Catherine, the ARK, and another chance at life. The original him died long ago with hopes and dreams silenced, now he had the chance at it again except that not much was left. The world may be gone but there’s plenty of things to do down here. Maybe there were stuff still intact up there? The Omega Space Gun was intact enough to even launch a new satellite into space.

“Ok,” he spoke and cleared his thoughts of worry and stress, “let’s do this.” He began the travel back to Tau, keeping an eye out for the Leviathan and that Whale in-case they wanted his robotic insides. When he reached the WAU, he found more growth of the gunk and foliage than before. On a cracked screen brought in from the original Site Alpha, it displayed images of the above before the Impact Event. No doubt, planning and learning to “revive” what was up there. It’s sick, twisted version of it. 

Then, he looked back at the hole next to his way out. A dark trail of Structure Gel leaked out of it down back into Alpha. Some scrap metal followed along with what looked like a leg or a mutilated arm. Ross? He’s been brought back once, he could have been brought back again. That or something worse found him. An angler fish? No, no, he already saw that on his way to Tau and it was barely his size. An octopus? Maybe. That’d be terrifying, covered in faces on every angle with glowing lights illuminating the dark with a false sense of hope. Regardless, they were heading in the same direction so he’ll find out whether he likes it or not. When he passed by the ruins of Alpha again, he wondered if there were any human staff here? What happened to them? There were rooms seemingly built to house them but not a single body or indication was to be found. Out of every Site he’s been to, this one is in the worst state of the WAU’s overhaul to “save” Humanity. 

The trail would stop then reappeared from what he could tell, larger clumps became smaller and smaller every time he found them again with his Power Suit helmet’s light. The anglerfish stalked him from afar in the dark, the human face on its side writhing in seemingly anguish. Did it have a human brainscan? Did the WAU graft someone onto the fish? God, Simon didn’t even want to imagine it. He pushed on into Tau, passing by the crushed body of Neil Tsiolkovsky, the Russian crew member of Tau. Simon wondered about using his suit for Catherine. It was mostly intact except for the face region and basically the upper half of the body. Nevermind, he’ll go with the original plan. Better a good suit then one where the top half is useless, he wouldn’t get to see Catherine’s face and he didn’t have the skill to repair it. 

He managed to get back to the living area, still set up and livable if he needed a place to hang out. There was the bodies of Auclair and the rest of the ARK team were there. He read the old records and files still active on the terminals he found, thankfully a few kept paper journals during their last days. To extend his trip here, he searched around for the possible whereabouts of the crew. Auclair was in his room, malformed by the WAU into this...cacoon thing. What was it doing with him? Was it trying to rebuild him? Back at Omicron he saw what the “rebuilding” looked like with that crew member in the orange jumpsuit. Malformed: one leg was longer than the other, the proportions of his body oddly shifted, and the machinery in his chest of course. 

Then he found the trail again. It led to one of the corner vents in the main area of the living quarters, the grate was popped open. Simon crouched down, turning on his flashlight to get a better look at the insides. Structure Gel bubbling and slightly growing until it died back down only to do so again in a cycle. “The hell is here?” He went over to Johan Ross’s room, pressing the button only for it to deny access. He pressed it again. Access denied. He slammed his fist against the button. Denied. “WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!” He kicked the door with full force, making a small dent in the metal.

The Data Buffer cracked to life. “You had your chance to save Humanity and what did you do?! You threw it away! Now it’ll infect and infect the world, making the grand illusion that we’re still alive! All for what?! The ARK? Another illusion of our existence! A mockery!” 

“Ross? You’re alive! The Leviathan--”

“The WAU tried to silence me! I breathed again thanks to the Structure Gel, no matter what it keeps me alive with it pulsating in my veins. Now I have to use the weapon of my enemy in order to destroy it. I need a body Simon! I can’t make one on my own, and I need the same Gel in yours. So, I’m going to replace your copy with my own.” The door opened with Ross leaping atop Simon, sending him to the ground. Ross clawed and smacked against the helmet; he howled like an animal and clawed like one too at the Power Suit. 

Simon threw him at the desk inside his room. Ross’s arm dislocated itself, the tissue and flesh still weak from the revival. “It’s over for us. It’s done,” he told the deranged man. Or what was left of the man, he was still human at her despite whatever the WAU put him through. His mind may be centered on one goal, but if he didn’t have that goal he would realize that it was over, that there was no point anymore to taking his Structure Gel to infect it. He was still human to a degree, nothing like Sarah but what else would convince him?

“I have to stop it! Humanity--”

“Ross,” Simon tried a less aggressive tone, “Think about it. It’s just you and me, the last  _ sane _ beings left on this earth. The only true human that was left alive is dead. Sarah’s gone, she couldn’t go on anymore. Nothing else mattered, no way to reproduce and save us, even if you killed the WAU what would you do after that? Kill yourself? Kill everything is brought to life? All the life still living?”

Ross just looked at him, blue lights flickering in his weakened state like a broken computer, his posture slumped. His metallic and rotted insides slowly spilled out with some just hanging there still attached to their original pieces, the tube connected to his head scrunched up every time he took a deep breath. He leaned against the chair with what was left of him. They both listened to the fan go and the clock go by. “Is it really over?” His voice was broken. “Did we really lose? Can we have lost?”

Simon took a seat in front of him. “The ARK launched, our memory and the copies of us are up there. Thousands of years, maybe even more, they’ll be in Paradise. Now down here, us, the WAU, these creatures, we’re all that’s left of the living. Sure, Humanity may be gone but at least life is still flourishing. We’re still living. Maybe someplace up there is still intact, maybe something is still up there worth living for. The scans, even though they’re not  _ us _ or truly human they still have a chance to make this...work. Without the WAU, none of this was possible. Sure, it may have led to people losing it. To the monsters killing people at Tau, the fall of Theta, Upsilon’s abandonment, and so much more. Despite all that, here we are. You  _ died _ , Ross, a part of you did but the WAU saved you. Saved what was left of you yet your mind is still intact, you still have that. Think. Use it. Is killing the WAU really going to make the world much better than it already is?”

Ross didn’t say anything. Simon didn’t know where that part came from, he did know that Catherine would be proud of him. What else did they have to live for? They had to live just because the world needed live to continue, even if they weren’t human they had to go on. 

“You...you have a point.” Ross’s voice was gloomy, he didn’t want to admit it but what else did he have left? Everyone he wanted to protect was dead. They’re long gone. The last human left alive didn’t want to live, they simply wanted to die. He looked up at Simon.“Why did you come here? Why come to Tau? To my room?” 

“I’m trying to fix... _ my friend _ , Catherine. The WAU gave me some kind of vision, I guess, on how to fix her. Kinda like how I made the body for me using...Herber. The one part that it didn’t tell me was how to actually get her into the suit. Catherine was the only one who knew how and I doubt it’ll tell me in any way that makes sense.”

“ _ Friend _ ? Hmm...I can figure it out if you get me some of her notes. The schematics or anything,” Ross suggested. “Why not? I’ll put myself to use down here.”

Simon, surprised by this revelation, was speechless with joy. “Y-You will? You’ll help me get her back?” Such hope was in his voice at the thought of his chances being greater. 

Ross nodded. 

“Theta. She had a room in Theta. Akers was there with his Proxies if they’ll be trouble. I think he died when the tunnel flooded.”

“What else did you need?” 

Simon explained everything from the vision to him. The Power Suit, the Structure Gel, and the Cortext Chip he’s already collected. How he came here to get one of Ross’s jars of Structure Gel that was hidden in a compartment in his vent. Ross turned around, climbed up and revealed the jar that was there. 

“This is how I knew the WAU was changing, I watched it infect one of the plant life when I was out with Glasser so I collected a sample before he had to pull me back.” Ross thought back to his colleague, the only one that believed him about the WAU and the threat it posed. “And he died trying to get me to Omicron. Glasser, the ever noble and proud man, charged forward unto death without a second thought. Here I am, doing what I can to honor him. He studied life so I’ll make sure that there’s life to be studied.” 

As the two talked, a monitor over in the communication hub sparked to life:

_ WARNING, SATELLITE DESCENT DETECTED. IMPACT NEAR SITE THETA. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the long wait! School is starting soon so the consistency may lack from time to time but rest assured that this story will not go unfinished!


	5. "The Mountain of Omega"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Simon stares down the barrel leading from Phi to Omega. From the records he found, a diver from Tau managed to climb the barrel all the way to the top and never returned. Following his WAU vision, he traverses the same footsteps. All the while an object hurls itself back down to Earth unaware to both Simon and Ross. Will he make the climb or will he fall back into the depths of despair? What else will be reawakened or find its way to Pathos-II?

**Chapter Five “The Mountain of Omega”**

Simon looked up at the gigantic barrel of the Omega Space Gun. To think someone actually climbed it to the top. Must have been some climber, or someone couldn’t turn back. He went with the more positive thought. He still held the Phi Storage Bag with some tools Ross managed to fix up despite the lack of legs.

He’d spent some time watching the WAU, talking to it and asking questions. Philosophical debates with one unspoken voice simply watching, answering in silence that spoke with thunder. Maybe the WAU would give him legs again, who knows. It got Simon this far and brought him back from the dead at Upsilon. Why? He didn’t ask. He didn’t want to know. He believed he was lucky to get a second chance. Knowing would break his happy lie. Is that better? 

The creaking metal brought Simon back to the present. 

“Ok, ok, ok,  _ ok _ ,” he muttered to himself. The only thing he even did close to this back in Toronto was the hill Jesse wanted to topple at four in the morning. He slowly eased himself over the railing to the barrel of the gun. The helmet-light sparked up after he messed around with his back. Thus the long journey began. 

Ahead of him he could see only the barrel besides that was nothing. The Abyss illuminated nothing save for the dread of what lies in it. The Leviathan was far off near the WAU acting as the last defense. Did it have a personal connection with it? He didn’t want to know that either. All the faces gave him nightmares that they were actually people trapped forever in the same body, all wondering what’s going on with the only bit of agreement that was there was the need for Structure Gel. It was the only thing that kept some of these creatures alive. Like those drones up at Upsilon when he first found out he wasn’t...human. Who were they? What happened to them? 

Along the way he found caps to oxygen tanks left behind, still floating up in the deep sea they were trapped in. The climb itself was not hard or confusing, the only challenge was his mentality about the walk. He’s walked the ground of the Abyss itself, the emptiness of it didn’t bother him since the path was clear with him knowing where he would be not long into it. Glasser’s hut, the Light Drone Station, the tunnels near Tau, Site Tau, Alpha, Phi, he could find him. He was guided by Ross and Catherine at the time. That was then.

Now he was guiding himself, the path ahead was sightless and unknowable. Was he really going? It’s been hours and yet here he still was on the barrel separating him from death. The thought of taking the dive etched at him. Scratched, scratched, scratched, scratched, scratching at his walls of resolve. 

Maybe if he took the plunge…

“Stay focused,” he could hear Catherine say. “Keep going. Don’t lose hope. Stick to the bright side.  _ Don’t stop _ .” 

Simon pushed onward. 

Another hour passed. He saw the roof of the sky and the yellow sun up where it should be. Dark clouds filled where blue should be; Simon wondered if the nights were just as beautiful from before, he hoped so. He reached out and felt his fingers break the barrier, the warmth spread as the rest of him emerged, he got through.

He was finally out. He was  _ out _ . 

Site Omega wasn’t much in comparison to the others though there were some living areas, offices, and a kitchen. The perfect place to live out the rest of your days with the best view of a dead world. Out on the deck, when he glanced around the corner, was a body. It wasn’t alone, it sat in a chair with books at their side, a bottle of alcohol, and a Power Suit up on a hook. 

Simon recognized the Power Suit’s markings, they were from Phi or Tau, he could never remember which one was which. But someone actually did it. Some regular old joe climbed the barrel all the way here, living out their last moments reliving what they could of their old life, of the old world. A man’s flannel and jeans with the best alcohol there could be around, whiskey from Toronto, nice touch. Blood stained around their mouth and nose, their eyes closed with satisfaction, and the body relaxed one last time. Even when the world ended, someone still managed to fulfill a dream. He wished he could have had the same resolve as her. 

There was one book still open resting atop their legs. It was poems by Keats, a good read for your last moments on Earth. The sun hung low in the sky, vibrant ever so still, yet it now shone light to a dead world, somewhere out there it was still on fire.Everything was either ash or on fire. Do the cities still stand? Does the world still have the memories of Humanity outside Pathos-II? He wondered if Toronto was still there, if his apartment still existed. 

“Simon? Are you there?” Ross’s voice sparked through the radio nearby. “Simon, there’s a problem. Something’s blowing up an old system alarm. The screen’s cracked, I can’t read what it says, is there something wrong? Can you confirm?” 

He hobbled on over to the closest terminal:

_ DESCENT DETECTED. _

_ BRACE. _

_ BRACE. _

_ SITE THETA: BLACKOUT POSSIBLE _

_ SITE DELTA: BLIMP IN IMPACT PATHWAY _

_ SITE OMEGA: INFORM SITE STAFF _

_ BRACE _

_ BRACE _

_ BRACE _

Simon looked out the old glass window to see a streak in the sky. Another comet? Another world ending asteroid, comet, meteor, whatever?! Was it the ARK? No, no, it was too small to be a comet or the like. Too fast to be an asteroid or a meteor. What the hell was it? It got closer and closer, larger and larger, debris broke away and landed in the ocean. It flew past him, too close for comfort, smashing all the windows with the wind and threw Simon back against the terminal. 

“Simon! What was it? Si--bzzzzzzzzzz”

He rushed out to the deck to look at the floating debris passing by. A metal plate marked with the words:  _ PATHOS-II KAPPA SATELLITE  _

The ground shook, the barrel wobbled a little bit, Simon lost his footing and fell back. He grabbed the foot of the Power Suit to hold on. The entire thing broke off the hook and came crashing into him. They both fell off the deck, colliding into the barrel and sliding down. He tried to grab the suit and a ledge to hold on only for him to slip. Falling into the deep sea with a large splash, slowly finding his way back down, away from the sky of Heaven, back down to the depths of Hell. 

There is no greater darkness than the very thoughts and the depths they originate from when our minds are alone to think. On top of the mountain or in the depths of despair. That’s what he thought as he and the suit sank back down. The view of Site Omega fading into nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again! I'm sorry for the delay! School is back which means I won't pump them out quite as frequently and I draft each chapter now in a notebook to keep things fluent.


	6. "The Depths of Despair"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Simon slowly sank to the depths of the ocean and his mind. He can't sleep as the hours drag on while he goes deeper and deeper.

Simon slowly sank.

Simon was still awake.

He could not sleep. His mind would not stop acting and acting, thinking and thinking, wondering and wondering. The Power Suit fell as quick as he did and as slowly in the long fall to the dark depths. Ross’s voice died under the storm of his thoughts.

Simon was never afraid of the ocean. It never  _ really _ bothered him. He lived so far that sometimes he would forget all about it until someone mentioned it. That never reminded him of the terrors in the deep long before the WAU was even thought of. The works of Lovecraft that Jesse would read, the comics anyway, always had some monster in the sea that none knew about and those who did went mad. Who knew they were real? Not Eldritch gods or Old Ones. WE made this. WE thought of this. No monster will ever be as terrible as Humanity. The WAU was our idea. It had our commands and orders to carry out. 

Did the machine do what it thought was best? Ross once said that it could never know what it is to be, that we couldn’t trust its motives and actions and that no matter what we would be screwed over at its hands, but here was Simon and he knew not what it meant to be. He wasn’t sure anyone else did. We all have our thoughts and beliefs on the matter. No one could ever have one complete thought that everyone deemed true. Someone always asked the “but” then came with their ideas and debates. 

Could a machine know what centuries of Humanity did not? How long has it been alive? Couple of years at most, he guessed, it made the thought scarier to think about. Only when the world died did we ever come close to understanding and they didn’t even get to know the answer. 

Now Simon thought back to his life before Pathos-II, before Catherine, before the WAU, before everything. Did he even know what it was to live? Growing up he and everyone else knew that they had to go to school, go to college, work, and hopefully retire before 70. Along the way they were going to live and have a life with a family too. His mom used to tell him to live life to the fullest, to make a bucket list of have done when he was on death’s door, so that when the day comes he’ll be happy with his life. Then the accident stole that from him or did he steal it from himself? He thought back to the days beforehand, lazy and following a schedule compared to after when he thought he could do anything. 

Only to give up in the end, the list still incomplete, and went down a failure. We know only when life was limited on what it was to live. When time starts counting down in our minds instead of in the open air beyond reach, leaving us to assume time  _ is _ on our side. Dread can find itself over us, creating ideals and philosophies on how to live life so that we can feel achieved when we do die. We find value in our lives where others may not. Objects or goals that give them meaning. 

Now Simon thought about now.

What is he going to do with his life? He couldn’t die, not again, he had to make something out of this. Right now he was getting Catherine back but what then? What happens after that? If he succeeds or fails, what’s he going to do then? Go back to the surface? Try and restore Pathos-II? Build himself a home in the destroyed Earth? Learn what he could? Ross and Catherine could have more ideas.

When he woke up back in Upsilon some time ago he never expected that he would end up here. Here as in...as in...he didn’t know. 

He looked down to still see he was sinking into the depths. His mind was starting to run out of things to think over without driving himself clinically insane. But he could delve back deep into another matter. Ross has asked him why. Why he was doing this, risking everything just to get back the shadow of a woman that died. That the person he was trying to bring back into the dead world was just the mind. 

He told Ross that it was because he messed up, it was his fault. But Ross stopped him.

“That’s not why. Why is only true when you don’t cover it up. Simon, what is your really why for this? I have my why for helping you.”

He didn’t know then. He couldn’t dig up his truth, his mind nearly drowned itself trying to force it all out.

Now he found it emerging.

He wondered if Simon on the ARK had the guts to tell her. He hoped so.

Right now he imagined her descending with him. They had philosphied what it meant for them to exist and for the ARK, if they knew about the coin toss. Then talked about what it meant to be, to live, what gave them purpose each and every time they woke up. Catherine would have brought up the fact they don’t sleep. As well as her inability to walk, blink, move a finger, all the finger details about her current state of being. IN that solace of a moment he would have told her. For all he knew they might as well be dead floating down here. The Leviathan or some other creature could easily crunch them up into electrical bits without a second’s hesitation. So he spoke aloud. 

“Catherine,” he said staring into the blue void around him. 

“Yes, Simon?” she would say. Her monitor flickering a little bit. 

“Since this may be our last few minutes, moments, great leap together, I might as well just tell you. I--”

The thud of the sea floor silenced him.

The moment was gone.

He was alone again.

He looked down to find that he just bumped into a deformed manta ray. 

“Simon? Are you okay?” Catherine would ask.

He blinked a few times, his thoughts returning to him as well as the moment. Catherine was still there waiting for him. Now she wasn’t the Omnitool with a face but back into a regular human body that he saw for the ARK back in Theta. She was...he knew the words but they wouldn’t come out without a stutter. She seemed to notice, even past the screen of the Power Suit and the circuitry that was his face. He wasn’t a machine. Wasn’t Robo-Simon 2 or even just some copy of a dead man. Simon was Simon regardless of how many there was or will be he will always be him. At his core he’ll always be some variation of himself. He’d always have these human emotions, that’s what kept him sane from the deep insanity down here. 

Simon took a deep breath, closed his eyes, relaxed the tension dwelling in the corpse’s body, and let it all out.

“Y’know, when I lost Ashley to the accident and the brain damage started to kill me, I never thought that for the rest of my days that I had left in me that piece of me would never heal. The trauma and dying brain broken me. Deep down ‘I knew this was it, this is the start of the end’ everyday until Munshi. Even when I had my life seemingly back in my hands, I knew that I would never truly let go of her, never really get over here, never really love someone like her, then I met you, Catherine.

I get it, I get it, ‘we’re the last two sane people so it was bound to happen’ is a cliche I remember Jesse talking about. I even thought that after the Curie exploded and we were stranded at Delta. I took a moment to sit at the edge with the K-8 and talked to it about you and all this. It couldn’t talk but I’m sure it tried to encourage me. That or it was scared of the plateau, I was too. Then Theta and Omicron. I’m sorry for what I said, when Robo-Simon was still talking, I was...I don’t know. Terrified? Scared? 

When he existed for that moment, I thought that I was just replaceable to you. You could have any Simon or even yourself do the job. Maybe that’s why. I let emotions get the best of me even when you explained it, I got beaten then and then at Phi it happened again. I wanted out. Out of this never ending hell we were trapped in. I didn’t think that I wouldn’t carry over. I had too much hope in the toss. For a moment, I saw the ARK, even now I can still see the river, the grass, and  _ trees _ . I didn’t think I’d ever say that. Eternity among the stars wasn’t for me. Not this me, anyway. But I imagine that that us never forget Earth, home, the people we left behind, or this us that didn’t make it. The people in paradise forget the people trapped in hell for all eternity. 

What I’m trying to say, Cath, are three simple complex words I said on the ARK:

I love you.

Catherine, I really do, I can promise you that.”

The weight of the world fell off his chest. He could finally breathe. 

“I love you too, Simon” she said, she had before the ARK when he wasn’t listening, and this was something Simon didn’t have to imagine. 

He gently touched the deep ocean floor. The twirling of rotor blades echoed in the distance; getting closer and closer to him every second. Two figures emerged, shadowed by the Abyss with only one bright light illuminating them not. They grabbed Simon and the Power Suit, dragging him away. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It wasn't my goal of 3,000 words but I managed just barely 1,700!


	7. "Dead Men Walking"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After falling from Omega, Simon finds himself on board a submarine with an unlikely crew.

Chapter 7 “Dead Men Walking” 

Simon woke up to fluorescent light shining directly in his face. One bright light above with two smaller ones at his side. Those were moving. He could hear a distant, muffled rotor close by, heavy and bulky. His surroundings started to become clearer. 

Metallic walls with barnacle and coral, electronics and pipes actively working, a light bulb swinging back and forth. Orange Power Suits looking down at him, their faces obscured by yellow paint over the visor, made from whatever they could find down here by the looks of it. An intercom sparked to life:

“It keeps burning out.  
It will soon fall apart altogether.  
It’s the ancients.  
In these halls, even the soulless mourns,” a voice, old and reverend, harrowed by scars, recited in the scratchy microphone for those that could hear. Footsteps echoed down, close and far, tool ignited, valves turning, and oxygen tanks squeaking. 

Simon wasn’t tied down, restrained, or hindered at all. They were just looking at him. Tools in hand but lowered away from him. Orange Suit 1 and 2 stepped away, turning their backs to talk to themselves, if they even could. He leaned up to find that he was in some sort of medical lab or garage that had a child together. He was on a gurney. Power Suits 1 and 2 had yellow print on the back.

1 had “AHAB” while 2 was “ABEL”. 

On a small tray next to him was the Omnitool and his bag. The Power Suit was nowhere to be found. 

“Where am I? Who are you!” Simon demanded from them, snatching his things and backing up to the exit. 

Ahab and Abel sharply shot back, raising the hands to reduce tension. Yet not a word was spoken between the two. They slowly inched closer to Simon as his hand neared the door controls.

“Have no fear, brother, you have found the Commune.”

Simon turned to see a Red Power Suit with phytoplankton plastered like a crown over where their forehead should be. Red and orange coral decorated the shoulders and arms like ornaments of honor or hierarchy. The visor was dark brown. On their chest was the yellow print: ASTOCLES

What was with all these A-names? He thought as he stepped back. The situation was not going great. When did it ever?

Astocles was accompanied by two other Power Suits much like Ahab and Abel. He had a mannerism of a prophet with the way he spoke and the way he adorned himself. Simon was never really a man of the faith but he’s pretty sure Astocles was Greek in some way.

“Ease yourself, the Holy Creator of the Burned World gave you life and sent you to sanctuary. The Commune harbors all Cabal. Born of droplets we walk anew, the past an eroded bygone of a time before us, we walk forever in its shadow,” Astocles told him. “You came with a shell without form or mind. You bear tools to shape one to life. Are you the Creator’s Messiah? Have you seen him? Has another seen He Who Bleeds since the days of Areolar? Tell us, brother, are you his Messiah?”

“You mean the WAU? I’ve seen it, talked to it, and I guess befriended it with my luck. Saved it from dying too,” Simon explained to them as it came to his mind.

The Cabal gasped in shock.

“He knows the Creator’s name!”

“The Messiah has come again!”

“We are not worthy!”

“Areolar reborn!”

They stepped aside, Astocles gestured for Simon to follow. What choice did he have? They knew this place better than anyone else and it was just him that was the “anyone”. They went up a ladder to a little command room that you’d see in some science fiction movie when you saw the bridge of a ship but more down to earth. Other Power Suits-Cabal, he reminded himself, working away at terminals and other electronics. They were all purple with the black visor, how they managed to create so many colors from coral and goo was beyond him. 

“Welcome! Welcome! Welcome the Holy Messiah to the Affectionate Awareness! Make way to the Commune!” Astocles preached and was followed without question. The submarine shifted directions, creaking loudly in the silent deep. 

“Can I leave? Look, I need to get back to Tau? Do you know where Tau is? Omicron? Theta? Phi?” Simon interrupted the preacher. “I have to go back. I have to--”

A loud BONG knocked out the power and threw the submarine onto its side. The crew flew into the wall as it crashed into the sand. From the reinforced glass window they could see a long, massive, dark creature pass by. The Whale. Its box mouth still with the metal shards of whatever it broke apart or was infused with hung low as many faces along the body writhed in pain. The gigantic blue eyes staring aimlessly at them. The body itself was sliced in complete half then put back together with extensive amounts of Structure Gel. 

However, the Commune was not interested in it. They pointed to smaller figures emerging from the darkness towards them. Simon thought they all died in the Curie. There were more of them, more than he imagined. Eerily walking with their bloated heads, blinking lights, and the sand colored bodies drawing focus to their upper half. Of bodies that fell into the deep. Members of ships like the Curie that the WAU’s restoration found unharmed, or sorry sods that lost their will to stay. The Flesher or Jjianshi as Catherine once called them. 

Astocles sounded the alarm. The Cabal ran here and there, hiding or preparing to fight with tools, they spread out all over the submarine despite Astocles’ pleas to stay. The only ones that did were Ahab, Abel, and three others. Amidst the chaos the two brought blowtorches and welders with them, and the three only had themselves and their wrenches. Astocles tugged on Simon to follow. “Come, Messiah, to the Commune.. Through the Old Way. We must go.”

“I’m not going to your Commune! I’m going back to Tau! T-A-U. Pathos-II!” he yelled and pulled back.

“Pathos? The home of the enemy? Why-yes! To strike at their hearts! To Pathos!” Astocles declared. He led the charge down the tight halls of the Affectionate Awareness. Abel and Ahab pushed Simon along until he moved himself. These things were nutjobs! Worshipping the WAU as a god. God left Humanity to die and they did. Now the dead are calling technology him. It didn’t matter. He just needed to get back to Tau. What was he missing while he’s away?

They climbed a ladder up to another section. Below he could hear the Fleshers tearing apart the Cabal for the Structure Gel. Muffled screams were ended by the screeching of metal. Simon went back to help the other three get up so Abel could seal the hatch. The last one struggled to get their footing when the screeching got louder. 

“Come on!” Simon exclaimed and reached out.

The power shut off. The emergency lights came on. 

A Flesher was behind the Cabal. It yanked it down by thrusting its hand through the chest, tearing it apart until the body went limp, coats of blood splattering all over Simon. 

“Close it! Close it!” he yelled, jumping back from the scene. Ahab and one other slammed it shut and threw themselves atop it. The Fleshers banged and banged on the metal. Abl grabbed the welder to seal the gate between them and death. 

The banging stopped. The other Cabal listened against the metal.

A hand broke through, smashing the glass visor to reveal their horrid face. Bulging eyes without skin! Flesh rendered far from human and mouthless yet it still screamed the terror of one! It reached out to them but they fled when more tore through to feast on the Cabal. 

“RUN!” Simon dragged Abel and Ahab along, turning a corner to find Astocles and the other purple Cabal standing in horror at the mere sight of an opened door leading to what looked to be an older section. They shoved their way inside, ignoring the protests of the prophet muffled by their adrenaline and sealed themselves inside.

“You have doomed us, brother’o’Messiah.” Astocles lost his being to dread, sourness, and sorrow.

“Why? What’s wrong?” Simon asked, befuddled at their strange mood. This section was devoid of lights. He pointed to the wall. Simon flashed his visor to see what it was:

“LET THESE BE THOSE OF THE CORAL,  
DEVIL TO THE CREATOR,  
LOST TO US FOREVER,  
BOUND OT THE MIND”

He saw the coral, it consumed the zeppelin pad at Delta and overthrew Theta.

Akers…

That memory, that monster, ruined Theta as one of the last places of Humanity that still functioned. Now they’re all dead! What’s left of them kept alive by the Coral to dream endlessly. He wasn’t even sure he killed him when the tunnel flooded. He hoped so.

“Just don’t touch it. How long have you sealed this place off?”

“Not that long. A few still roam, thinking themselves sleepers to imprison the dreamers among us,” Astocles answered.

Right, cult stuff, Simon thought and pressed on.

“Where’s the exit hatch?” he asked while checking an intersection. Four ways to go with four signs. 

“Somewhere here. Bright blue lihgt. Way of Creator,” Abel spoke for the first time. It reminded him of those foreign partners in American Buddy Cop movies that didn’t know English too well.

“Abel, your vow of silence for the Creator!” Astocles hissed at his underling.

“In death the Creator forgives, Holy Messiah worth the break,” he answered as his flashlight sparked to life, deep yellow compared to Simon’s bright white. Even for a whatever he gained Simon’s respect. “Four ways. Five of us. One goes alone.”

They investigated the Coral infected signs:

Section Z- pwr Iput  
Section E- Cf + Soage  
Sec D0 Es ds  
Sction S- Droe Cntrs

The gunk and coral made it difficult to decipher what they said. They had to have luck that they found the hatch at all.

“I’ll check out Secion S with Abel. Astocles check out E with the other guy. Then head to D. Ahab--” SImon was interrupted by the Purple Cabal.

“I got E. Astocles can check out D,” he said then walked off. 

“What’s his deal?” Simon asked Astocles.

Ahab heard a distance clicking, he ventured off away on his own for but a moment. 

“Insubortanance will not be tolerated in the Commune. Our lives are for the Holy Creator. He will do as he does for him. He dies then he dies for your safety.”

Ahab tapped on Simon’s shoulder.

“Yeah?”

The mute signed to Abel to which he answered for him. “Blue light, he found.”

The other Cabal’s scream petrified them.Whatever was in here tore him limb from limb.

“RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!” Simon yelled and followed Ahab to the exit hatch. There indeed was a bright blue light illuminating the exit alright. They hit the switch, the doors hatch unsealed and sucked them out. They flew far into the ocean before landing on a patch of bones. 

“That could have been worse,” Simon said as he made sure he had everthing from his bag. A beeping on his suit sprang to life. He fiddled with his wrist until he found a portable radio. 

“Simon! Simon are you there? You can hear me but I can’t hear you. Listen, you need to get back to Tau! We have a problem. The tracker should lead you back. It concerns the WAU, I can’t say anymore. I think they’re listening! HURRY!” 

As the group fled into the ocean towards Pathos-II, a figure emerged from a patch of coral. 

“Why won’t you sleep? Close your eyes. Accept it. It’s okay. I’ll find a purpose for you, eventually. You’re looking for you,right. I saved them. Put them to sleep. They are safe. These sinking halls, this dead world is not worth saving, only life is precious. The warden will watch over us as we sleep. We failed to save this earth and ourselves. Salvation can only come from the divine warden…”


	8. "Back to Tau"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After escaping the submarine with newfound friends, Simon makes his way back to Tau to regroup with Ross and finally complete his mission.

“Back to the Frying Pan”

“Tau’s just over here! Come on!” Simon called back to the others. Astocles lagged behind the rest with his visor light flickering. They’ve been walking for hours on end in the darkness, slowly descending down into the Abyss. Simon couldn’t stop thinking about how close he was. So close! He felt like he was missing something. The rush of the escape jolted his brain into “act now, think later” until now. He’d figure it out when he got to Tau. 

“Messiah, we are surrounded by the emptiness. I trust in your direction but I fear that something is swarming around us,” Astocles hollered over the dust storm. He eyed the long body of a creature swimming outside their light. 

Simon looked back to see what it was. A red dot glowing in the darkness, mandibles twitching as the faces morphed into its body howled in pain. The Leviathan.

“Yeah, I see it,” he told Astocles. “It’s a good sign.”

“How? It is a beast like the Whale that sent us aground? Unless it is a messenger of the Holy Creator?” Astocles questioned. He kept his faith in check as they traversed the shadowy path. He followed his creator’s will to the very end. 

“Uh...sure,” Simon answered him.

“You don’t sound certain, Messiah?” Abel remarked. 

“Look,” Simon began to change the subject, “we’re getting close. I know it. There should be something just up here!” He pointed to a post in the ground up ahead. The top emitted a blue light. The path to Tau.

“What is it that you must find at this Tau? Will it help end the Fleshers of old?” Astocles spoke out as they gathered around the light. 

“I told you, I”m not interested in your conflict,” Simon told him. “I’m just trying to get someone back. You want help? Ask the Holy Creator, WAU, or whatever name you call him.” 

There came a silence. 

“You are his Messiah! You are the reborn Areolar of the Commune! You will enact his will!” Astocles argued. “It is why you came to us! Why he sent you!”

“There is no why! I fell off a platform and floated down here. The WAU had nothing to do with it.”

“You have forgotten yourself!”

Ahab interrupted the argument with two flashes of the headlight. He pointed off in the distance to a light coming towards them. Brighter than their own. Pure white and fluorescent. It got closer and closer. 

“What is it, Messiah?” Abel asked.

“A WAU creature. Don’t remember what though,” Simon explained. “It certainly isn’t friendly.” He started heading towards the other post with Abel and Ahab at his side. The roar of the Leviathan sent them running. Up ahead was a small cave he hid in when Ross led him. He could see the glowstick far away. They slid inside before the mandibles snatched them up. They watched the long body swim away, the faces gazing dread into them. 

“Where’s Astocles?”

Simon scanned around the cave. It was just the three of them.

Shit.

“ASTOCLES! ASTOCLES!” Simon charged back out. Ahab and Abel waited anxiously. He heard the Leviathan take notice and make a U-Turn. Closer, closer, closer, closer. He could hear the roar as it snapped at him. He slid to the post on his back. It passed right over him and back into the sightless dark. 

If robots could shit themselves then I just did.

He saw Astocles walking towards the bright light.

“Holy Creator, what do you bless your faithful child among the faithless with?” 

Simon could see the long jaws of the creature getting ready to pounce. He scrambled to his feet and booked it. Thankfully Abel was carrying the bag for the stunt he was about to pull. Catherine would hound him for how stupid this is. 

He tackled the creature. Somehow.

Its jaws bit down into his left arm, piercing the metal and digging deep into the body. He screamed in pain as it dragged him away. He punched at its eye with his free arm until he struck the human face and it let go. Blood poured into the sea. Simon couldn’t feel his arm. 

“Oh fuck! Fuck!” he groaned while he laid on the ground. He struggled to get back on his feet. Astocles grabbed him and shook him violently.

“YOU DARE STRIKE THE MESSENGER?!”

“It was going to kill you!”

“I was to be delivered to the Holy Creator!”  
Simon broke free of his grasp. What kind of madman would let himself die out of superstitious belief? The WAU didn’t care! It couldn’t even think beyond one thing: SAVE HUMANITY and look what it did? He had an understanding with it but its goal had terrible deeds. More done by the people who had faith or believed the WAU was a higher being. That’s how tragedies happen. Someone believes in something so much they do anything that they believe would appease it. 

They didn’t talk on the way to the cave. Abel and Ahab were gone. They found a trail of rocks leading them to the other side where the two stared in awe at Tau’s entrance. 

“We’re here.”

They entered Tau. Although this was nothing new to Simon, the others were lost in amazement. 

“Ross, we’re here,” Simon radioed. “Ross? Ross, come in.” Nothing. Not even a noise from Jin. It was quiet. Not a sound besides them. 

“Halls of the Creator,” Abel gasped. They settled in the Dive Room where the terminal picked up on the new suit signals. They got their bearings together as Simon tried to get Ross. Still nothing. What the hell was going on? Jin shouldn’t be a problem. He can’t reach the living quarters.

There came a clicking in the ceiling.  
TICK, TICK, DINK, DINK, TICK, DINK, TICK, DINK!

“Move,” Simon whispered to the others. “Upstairs. Find it.” He shut off his visor light. The clicking got louder. There was more above them. They were watching. Waiting. Watching. Waiting. He saw tiny glowing blue eyes through the vents. They made a gurgling click noise as they stared down at them.

Simon slowly inched his way to the door. Each step carefully placed to avoid the monsters above. Then he made his way through Tau to the ladder leading up to the living quarters. He saw more of those things above and below him. What were those things? From the small looks he caught, they were not WAU creations. Were they something else? A bi-product? 

They ate away at the Structure Gel or were they consuming it? Tau looked almost cleaner than before. Did Ross do this or was it these things? But would they attack Simon and Ross? They were made of Structure Gel. All the more reasons to avoid them.

“Astocles? Ahab? Abel?” Simon whispered up the ladder.

He saw quick flashes of visor light followed by a crash!

Simon scurried up the ladder to find Ross hanging from a vent holding onto Abel. “Who are you? What are you?! Where’s Simon?!” the Tau scientist barked at the Cabal. He held out a blowtorch to Abel’s head.

“Ross! Ross calm down! They’re with me!” Simon intervened. “Relax. Okay? Relax? Breathe. Put down the blowtorch.” 

Ross let go of Abel, dropping the tool and let out a sigh of relief. “Thank all your back. What happened at Omega? Where’s the Power Suit?”

It dawned on Simon. 

He didn’t have it. He left it behind. 

He forgot the stupid Power Suit. The frustration boiled and boiled fast. He threw a tray at the wall and kicked over a chair. “God dammit! I had one job! One fucking job! Get the Power Suit and here I am without it! God dammit! FUCK! STUPID, STUPID, STUPID, STUPID SIMON RUINS SOMETHING AGAIN!”

“Simon! Simon calm down!” Ross climbed out of the vent.

“It’s not okay! I won’t get her back! Because I forgot the stupid--” Lights out.

He dreamt of his fall from Omega. The launch from Phi. Finding his way out of Omicron. Escaping Theta. The Curie. Lambda. Upsilon. The crash. Akers. The Coral. The dreams. 

“Sleep,” the cold voice of Akers whispered in his dreams. “Sleep…”

Simon woke up screaming.

“Shhh! Shhh!” Astocles whispered. 

Simon found himself in Ross’ old room. He noticed the power was out or that they had a night-mode he didn’t know about. Whatever it was it gave him a chill down his robotic spine. Ross himself was sitting in a chair with a pair of Power Suit legs he merged Structure Gel with. 

“W-What happened?”

“You passed out,” Ross told him.

“The Holy Creator gave you a vision,” Astocles put in. “What did you see?”

Simon explained what he could.

“Askers...the WAU drove him mad. I think I killed him during my escape from Theta. At least I hope that’s the case. With this dream, I’m afraid I’m wrong.” Simon remembered the last thing before he passed out. “The Power Suit!”

“It’s possible that there may be one in storage at Omicron,” Ross comforted him. 

“May?”

“Have hope, Simon. You have to have hope.” Ross stood up. “Those creatures, Solapsists as I named them, cleared the way for us. As long as we avoid them and leave them be we should be fine. I locked Jin up in a storage closet they cleared. Tau’s mostly ours again. Maybe they got to Omicron, you know? Hahahah!”

Simon laughed at his attempt at a joke.

“You’re a good man, Ross.”

“I learned from a better one.”

The two men laughed. 

“Let’s bring everything to Omicron, I know that place may hold some bad memories with the WAU but--”

“Simon, there’s another you, isn’t there?” Ross asked. “I read some reports your friend made. A little journal so to say. When you transferred over there was another you in the old body. He’s still there. What are you going to do?”

Simon thought for a moment. “I’ll tell him the truth. I hope he’ll understand.”

“If he freaks out?”

“We’ll figure it out.”

As they left for Omicron, Astocles told Simon he found the WAU but didn’t say anything on it. The prophet was awfully quiet the entire trip and ascent to Omicron. Up above, Akers watched the elevator rise up towards him. Everything was to plan. Soon they’d sleep.


	9. "One Shattered Mirror"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team has returned to Omicron, where Simon was transferred into his Power Suit and a copy of him was left behind, and they plan to see if they can scavenge for a Power Suit to replace the one Simon lost. However, something has followed them back and awaited their return.

**Chapter Nine “One Shattered Mirror”**

Simon stared down at the body. His body. His copy that sat at the edge overlooking the Abyss. Structure Gel leaked out the wrists and the jagged metal shard plunged into his robotic heart. His glass visor was shattered and his optics were in pieces. 

“I don’t believe it,” Simon said as he and Ross stared at the body, “he actually did it. I didn’t think that he--that I--” 

“He isn’t you. This person gave up.” Ross wasn’t great at comforting him over the dead copy. He tried at least.

His copy was gone. It should have comforted him but it left him uneasy. Simon chose to keep him alive. He could have given him mercy so he wouldn’t know they left him behind. They left him alone and afraid. He woke up. He freaked out. Where could he go? Everything he did got this Simon, him, to complete the mission while he stayed. While he was left behind like a useless tool. It was too much. He couldn’t go on.

Here he was.

Here Simon was.

One gave up.

One kept going.

They were truly different.

“Let’s get inside, we need to get started,” Ross told Simon and they went back inside. He won’t tell Catherine. Would he? He wasn’t sure it was the best idea. Hopefully Astocles didn’t find him. The Cabal would lose his mind. Whatever he saw or told the WAU shut him up. It unnerved Simon.

Ahab and Abel helped Ross carry in the tools and crates of supplies from some of the nearby rooms. Robot Girl was nowhere to be seen. Maybe she was hiding in the Power Room again. He just hopes that he doesn’t have to go back in there again. Last time was more than enough.

“Simon, I’ll need you to stay here so I can make adjustments to match your suit. Astocles, I need you to head over to the labs to grab Structure Gel if you could find some, or  _ a body _ to suffice, if you would. Ahab, go find a Power Suit in a storage room that should be sealed shut. Abel, go see if there’s drone parts in the lower level,” Ross instructed them.

They left the Dive Room and headed off to find the parts. Ross pulled up the old camera feeds and science stuff Catherine used.

“What do you plan to do?” Ross asked as Simon sat in the old chair.

“What do you mean?”

“ _ If _ we are successful, what do you want to do? Go back to the surface? Stay down here in Pathos-II?”

Simon thought for a moment.

“Fix up Pathos. Maybe we can do something for the people in the mind coral at Theta. Live there for what’s left of the world. The sun’s going to explode, right? Eventually? Back in Toronto I used to freak out about that. Just knowing that made things feel empty. That no matter what we do none of it matters in a thousand years or so when everything will be gone. Where we are buried, where we grew up, the impact we had, whatever we and what other generations do won’t matter. Everything will be gone. Jesse said we should colonize a new planet. Then what? Wait til’ that one falls apart? Its extinction on hold. We’ll die out eventually. Now...now we have. His idea doesn’t seem bad now.

I used to be so worried that I wouldn’t do much. Too much to do and not enough time to do it. Maybe pick up and instrument, learn how to swim, fly a plane, to do everything there is but to learn I can’t. It’s not possible. Even if I did, by the time I was 80’ or so there would be more to master. Now I have the time. Most of the world’s gone so the list is shorter. Might write poetry or a book for the audience of me, you, Catherine, Ahab, Abel, and heck, even Astocles. ‘The Man Out of Time’?”

_ The Man Out of Time _

_ Simon Jarret _

“What will you do, Ross? What do you want to do?”

“Continue Glasser’s work. Fix Tau. Fix all of Pathos-II, if I can. Then, after all that, I’ll see the surface again. Find what’s left of our burned world and restore what I can. There has to be something left out there. The WAU could make more scans. More life. We have the...bodies and the suits. Oh. The scan’s complete. Now let me see--wait, what’s that?”

Ross looked over at the monitors. He saw a Power Suit out in the main entrance sitting alone. “Ahab, investigate the main entrance. Tell me what you see.” The Cabal did as he was instructed. With the lockdown lifted they could access the front again.

Ahab tapped on the suit.

It fell over. On the side he noticed a strange substance left on the shoulder. This was the suit Simon had found at Omega. But how did it get here? He left it at the crashed submarine. What did Ahab see on the suit?

The camera went dark.

“Ahab?  _ AHAB _ ? I can’t see you. Report.”

The Cabal didn’t respond. A request to enter came in. Ross pressed the button then radioed the others. “Come back to the Dive Room. Come back! COME BACK!”

Static.

“Shhhh…..it’s time to sleep,” Ahab’s radio answered. It wasn’t the Cabal.

_ Akers. _

“Oh god.” Ross stepped back from the monitor. “What have I done?”

_ Akers. Akers...AKERS! _

Simon slammed his fist down. 

“FUCK YOU, AKERS!” he yelled and stormed off. Ross sealed the door shut behind him. Simon had to find Astocles and Abel. This nightmare had to end  _ now _ . He had an idea.

Simon rushed to the science labs. “Astocles,” he whispered, “where are you?”

Nothing.

He heard the contortions and gurgling from Akers upstairs. Each footstep echoed throughout Omicron. Simon’s was louder, he had to go slower to avoid being a bright neon sign that said:  _ KILL ME _ . He searched the labs through and through but he did not find Astocles.

Something touched his shoulder.

He swung around, ready to throw a punch when he saw Abel standing there shhhing him. “Thank god you’re alive; have you seen Astocles?” he whispered to the Cabal.

He shook his head. “Not since that abomination stepped in. He...he held Ahab’s head, ripped from the body. I have failed my brother.” The Cabal, if they could cry, sounded on the verge of tears. 

“Hey, hey, hey, you’re going to be ok. We just need to find Astocles and get back to Ross. Then we’ll deal with Akers.”

Abel nodded.

“There’s a Power Room across the intersection. We need to go there and see if Astocles hid there and if not we’ll use the vents to get around,” Simon explained.

“Monster knows the vents. Crying inside the hall room downstairs. Could be Astocles or not,” Abel added.

“There’s no use hiding,” their suits’ echoed Askers’ broadcast. “You’re trapped with me. I rid the sleepless girl into a beautiful dream. You will see it too. You won’t leave this place. You won’t bring life to a dead world! It’s useless! Pointless! Dream an endless dream! The WAU will take care of you. I won’t let you ever have a nightmare. Theta sleeps! You must too!” 

“Find Astocles, I’ll distract Akers,” Simon told Abel. He ran out into the intersection, making as much noise as possible, and yelled, “AKERS! YOU COME DOWN HERE! COME ON!” He ran down the steps to the lower Dive Room. Akers howled and gave chase. The tall monstrosity followed the noise, followed the restless dreamer, past the WAU’s mercy and into the room.

“Outside, Akers. Come on, let’s get this over with. I’m ready. I want to sleep,” Simon taunted him through Ahab’s radio. Akers threw the helmet against the lockers. He stormed out into the sea. The satellite wreck crushed one of the fisheries close to Omicron’s entrance.

“So that’s what screwed me over,” Simon remarked as he turned to face Akers. Somehow the monster was aquatic by strange means. This was it. This idea wasn’t his brightest but it was all he had. It could work. The odds were a coin toss. He hoped it was in his favor. He backed up to the wreck. 

“Shhhh...it’s over. Rest.  _ Rest _ …” Akers hissed as he got closer. 

Coin toss.

Coin toss.

Heads.

Tails.

Heads.

Tails.

“There’s nothing like a coin toss, Akers? I hope that Catherine never scanned you,” Simon still taunted him. Here he was again. At the end of the road with a hard choice. A hard toss. Win or lose. Somewhere in the cosmos the ARK stayed indefinitely. Paradise among the stars. He couldn’t stop thinking about everything he wanted to do once this was all over. Paradise in the stars. Paradise on Earth. Coin toss. Coin toss. The WAU would do anything to protect itself, right? 

“Hey Akers,” Simon said after Akers grabbed him by the shoulder. 

“Don’t you shush? What has you restless?” 

Simon looked over at his scared arm. Structure Gel was leaking onto the satellite. The WAU could hear it. The WAU sensed a possible threat inside the satellite. The Gel could interfere with its task. Its one goal.

_ It shrieked. _

“NO! NOOOO-” Akers’ head exploded when the blackbox burst. 

Simon dropped to the ground.

“Oh god...it worked! Yeah! Woooo! Hell yeah!”

He won the coin toss.

  
_ He won the coin toss _ . 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter after this then a note from me!


	10. "The Voyager"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the end. Their journey has come to a close. It's a coin toss now. The final chapter in SOMA: After the Launch has finally come!

**_Chapter 10 “The Voyager”_ **

“Catherine, can I ask you something?” Simon asked as they sat on a bench together. Catherine raised her head from his shoulder. This get-together at Reed’s was in an hour. 

“Yeah, Simon?”

“Do you ever think about the  _ us _ down there?”

Catherine looked at him. He hadn’t taken his eyes off the forest so far away. It’s been a few weeks since they got on the ARK. The others wondered why they suddenly appeared. They told their story minus the gloomy parts. It was nice to see Simon welcomed warmly. 

“Sometimes,” she told him. “Sometimes I wish that it was a one-way carry over. That no one had to feel abandoned. I hope we knew that. That everything was worth it. We made it. The ARK launched. Maybe I finally nailed down the coffin on how it worked. You were always a numbskull.  _ My  _ numbskull.”

“But what if you didn’t? What if you tried but I—he—didn’t understand?” 

“Simon, I”m sure they’re fine. Trust me. They’re okay. We’re okay. What else is on your mind? That can’t be it. I know you.”

“What about the people you didn’t get to scan? What about them? Theta, Delta, Upsilon, Lambda, Omicron, did you get them? Tau...Did you get Tau? Phi. Jesus, how many people did we have to forget about when we came here? We forgot about the WAU and the dead world. Doesn’t that eat away at people? Only us? How come my mind is plagued by this? I don’t get it. If we remember by thinking so much then what happens when we don’t think? When we just forget it all and moved on with our lives? How can people do that?”

“Simon, listen to me, you’re  _ over _ thinking. That’s why.”

They looked at the sunset.

“What would I do without you?” Simon remarked.

“Go mad? Lose yourself? The Man Out of Time would forget who he was/ He would cease to be.”

“Probably. If I lost you I would do anything to get you back.”

“I just hope you learn something.”

“Like what?”

“To be.”

~~

“What do you mean by ‘to be?” 

Ross looked up at Simon. They had just buried what remained of Ahab. Astocles still said nothing. Abel couldn’t conjure the words to express himself. They had the suit. They had the Structure Gel. They had everything to bring back one life. Even a body. Yet now they were one less. They could mourn later. Now they had to ensure he died for something. He died before something good could happen. People die while great miracles are about to spring up, moments after the passing, and the only thing we can do it carry on.

“To have consciousness. To be aware of your reality that is around you compared to how you see it. That’s my way of being,” Simon told him.

“I don’t know my meaning for it. Not anymore,” Ross admitted. “We should start the procedure soon. Now is now and should not be wasted.”

“Come on, let’s finish our mission,” Simon told him. They went back into Omicron and down to the Dive Room. There Ross had Abel bring in the Power Suit and set it in where Raleigh had hers. Ross stared at the Power Suit. He remembered convincing her to do this. She did everything he asked but when the time came the WAU screeched.

She died.

Omicron died.

All because of him. Being here reminded him how much death he caused trying to save them all. He killed them all. How many? What were their names? Carthage’s order. Site Alpha. The WAU. How much of him was still Ross? How much was a dead man? Too little? Too much? Had the real Ross died out completely and this was but a memory? He didn’t know. When he looked in the mirror he saw the rotted, defiled, corpse of Johan Ross.

_ I am still me. _

_ My name is Johan Ross. _

_ I am Johan Ross. _

_ I am real. _

_ I am not a copy. _

Ross opened the Power Suit. They needed a body. “Go upstairs and grab Julia Dahl’s body. She won’t be needing it anymore. In the cafeteria, Simon,” he told him.

Simon nodded and walked off. He remembered Dahl from when he came here with Catherine. The body wasn’t too heavy to drag. As he was passing by a small storage room to look for some tape to hold her onto a chair to make it a bit easier, he heard Astocles muttering to himself.

“You doing okay, Astocles?” Simon called out.

“I’m okay,” he answered delightfully. “I’m okay. We’ll be okay. Life goes on. The Holy Creator knows the way.” The way he said the words gave Simon chills. He brought the body downstairs to the Dive Room. Abel followed with the other tools and materials Ross would need.

“Proph--Simon,” Abel spoke.

“Yeah? What’s up?”

“I think that once this is all done I will return to the Commune with Astocles.”

“That’s far.”

“We’re needed.”

“What’s the Commune like? You two were trying to take me there originally then the sub crashed.”

Abel eased up. “One giant steel ship that submerged completely to the ground floor. I have not lived long to tell you the full history. Astocles was the second highest among our faith. Devoted to the end. He would kill for the Holy Creator. I’ve lost faith in what I knew.”

“Go on a spiritual journey then,” Simon suggested. “Find yourself not in the place you were but in a place you are not.”

If Abel could smile he would.

“Let’s make the Creator proud,” Abel told him.

They set up the corpse inside the Power Suit and placed the Light Drone’s optics where Dahl’s head should be. He popped open the cortext chip that stored Catherine. He slid it into place gently.

“It’ll work, Simon,” Ross told him. 

Simon held the jar of Structure Gel. The last step. He was almost anxious to what would come next. Would she still be mad at him?

As Simon was about to finalize their project they heard Astocles coming. He was laughing, giggling, to himself.

“Astocles, what’s so funny?” Abel stepped between Simon and the Cabal prophet. 

Astocles kept giggling. “Shhh…the Creator will watch over you. The  _ machine _ will protect us. He has guided us! He has lied to us! He is a liar! All the deaths and losses for nothing. The Commune is built on sticks. There is no great coming of Areolar! It is no god! Prime directive! Making the dead for nothing!” Astocles pulled out a chunk of sharp metal and drove it through Abel’s head.

“NOO!” Simon dropped the jar and rushed Astocles. They clashed, neither getting the upper hand, pushing the other towards the airlock. Ross rushed to the twitching Abel. The Cabal uttered one word before passing on. Ross got to work.

Simon and Astocles fought in the airlock as it decompressed and let the water in.

“The hell is wrong with you!?” Simon yelled. 

“I saw the Creator and I saw the liar behind the curtains! All is a lie!” Astocles tossed aside the chunk. “I will make all its abominations sleep!” His fingers now had small bits of jagged metal on them. He slashed and stabbed at Simon. The metal scraped against the Power Suit. 

Simon backed up against the railing far out, the Abyss was now below them, and the metal walkway creaked. Astocles moved faster than he could react. He couldn’t fight back without risking his own self. They were at the railing, one fought to overcome the other, and Astocles nearly had Simon over it. 

“The Creator’s truth must be spread! The Commune is living a lie! No one knows the truth but I! I am his prophet! I am his speaker! You have led us astray! I will lead us back! The false shepherd will die! Die! DIE!” Astocles yelled and raised his finger claws. 

Simon embraced this. He got this far. Maybe Ross could finish it and escape. If not then at least they gave life to a dead world with their purpose for a time. He closed his eyes and--

“YEEARGH!”

A wrench crashed into the back of Astocles, smashing his helmet open and he let go of Simon. They shoved Astocles over the edge as the madman cried out before his suit collapsed under pressure.

“Simon! Simon!”

He blacked out.

~~~

Simon watched the stars that night. It was...breathtaking.

“Mind if I join you?” Catherine walked onto the flat roof to find him. Everyone crashed after the game of UNO. Catherine was still up, she couldn’t get over her old habits of staying up working on the ARK. Now it didn’t bother her. The peace and quiet was nice.

“Go for it,” Simon told her.

“Were Toronto’s stars like this?”

“I’m not sure. I couldn’t ever see them when I wanted to and when I could I was distracted. Never took the time to sit and enjoy nature. People said I’m not a nature person but I am. I may not go out all the time but when I do I enjoy it.”

“Simon Jarrett? Nature person?”

“You don’t believe me?”

“I do! I do! Just used to the banter about the ocean.”

“Don’t get me started on the ocean!”

They both laughed and held hands.

“I’m glad I got into that car crash,” Simon said, “because without it I would never have been copied which means you would never get to start the ARK, we wouldn’t meet, and this would cease to be.” 

“Turn the bad into a good thing because the now would never be without it.”

“Agreed.”

“Even in the bleakness of impossibility there still can be probability if by the smallest chance, so we need to keep going because there is a chance regardless of odds.”

~~~

“Simon! Wake up! Simon?”

That voice…

“ _ Simon! _ ”

CATHERINE!

He woke up to see the Omega Power Suit’s visor display the face of Catherine Chun. It worked! It worked!

“You...Cath...I--” Catherine cut him off with a hug.

“I know, numbskull,” she told him. “I know.”

“ _ Astocles _ !” Simon exclaimed. “I couldn’t stop him. He killed Abel...He just snapped after he saw the WAU and the delusions of Akers.”

“It’s all okay. Now you’re going to have to tell me that story of how you figured  _ this _ out.” Catherine looked at her new body. It had been a long time since she walked on two legs, could touch, and could move outside the Omnitool. 

“Cath,” Simon mustered up the courage, “I--”

“I love you too, Simon,” Catherine told him.

“I...uh...you...uhh…” Simon stuttered.

“Simon, I may be an A.I. but I’m a human mind with human emotions. I figured it out.” 

Ross smiled on the inside as he watched them. 

Life went on. Death came and took but here they were still.

“Let’s get out of here,” Ross told them. “Let’s go home. To Theta.”

It took them a week to clean Theta. They found that the Proxies died alongside Akers when the WAU screeched for the second time. The power still worked and they managed to repair the majority of the appliances. Now that they believed themselves to be they saw their original bodies from their human days. 

Catherine worked tirelessly to do something about the Mind Coral Victims. She could transfer their minds over to new bodies inside Dive Suits, keeping them unaware. They would never know. It took a long, tiring, two months before it was perfected and she had copies of her crew up again. 

Simon didn’t know how to end this story. What sentence could make it satisfying? A joke? A thought-provoking question? Then, he figured it out and wrote it. 

Even when Paradise offers us eternal happiness we must not forget to forge our own on Earth and make our life count with this us that is now.

Eternity among the stars.

_ The End  _

_ (Author’s Note coming soon) _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note coming soon!


	11. (Late) Valentines Special "Toronto Valentine Surprise"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few weeks or so after the events of the main story, Catherine returns to Theta to find a surprise she didn't quite expect from Simon.

**Valentine’s Special: “Toronto Valentine Surprise”**

“Simon?” Catherine called out as she reentered Theta. “I”m back from Tau. Simon?”

She heard a small electrical boom followed by a fire extinguisher. “No! No, no! Come back here!” Simon ran out, completely ignoring Catherine as he followed where the vents led to. 

“What’s going on? Did some WAU creature get in again?”

“Uhh...no! I have everything under control.” He did not have everything under control at all. 

The banging in the vents continued. 

“What was that?”

“Nothing! Set the supplies in the living room. Do _not_ go into the lab!” He followed the noise into the DUNBAT room. “Ross, did it come out the other end?”

Ross ran out where Simon came from carrying a net. “It didn’t! Not yet!”

There was more crashing, colliding, tripping, and swearing as they chased whatever it was. Catherine laughed and set down the backpack full of Simon’s “Save Catherine” plan. He left more than he realized when he moved to Theta. The fish seemingly backed off from the trail after they patched up the holes in Alpha to keep any critters out. The Leviathan watched from the caves, waiting or, stalking for the right moment, but let them be. The “Cabal” Simon talked about haven’t been seen. Ross went on a trip to try and find their “Commune” to no avail. The submarine was empty of Fleshers and the old crew. It did have enough supplies to keep Theta stockpiled and repaired until they eventually travel to the surface. 

“Simon!” Catherine called out to him. “What’s going on? If it’s serious I need to know.”

Simon ran out as Ross went in. He grabbed a ladder. “Can’t talk! Here little sparkplug! I got some...uh Structure Gel for you!” He climbed up and spoke into the vent, dangling a small tube of gel at the opening. “Please!”

“Simon--”

“SIMON! I GOT IT! AGG! STOP! PLEASE!” Ross cried out followed by a crash. Catherine and Simon rushed over to the DUNBAT room to find Ross being licked to death by a mechanical-Structure Gel-thing that Catherine could barely call a dog. A dog. _A dog!_

“You-what-where-how-huh?” she gasped. 

“Surprise! Sorta, happy ( _late_ ) Valentines!” Simon did a little jazz hand notion. The “dog” was made of poorly pieced together metal making up for part of the head, body, and the back legs. The rest was the remains of a golden retriever mangled by whatever or wherever Simon found it. There was a green cord around its neck to make up for a collar with a blank plastic ID for a tag. It wagged its tail and gave a mechanical bark. 

“Simon, I have so many questions right now.” She pet the dog cautiously as Structure Gel leaked out of its ear and nose. 

“Okay. To answer the first one when Ross was scrounging around the Cabal’s submarine he found its body in the old freezer. Apparently they still ate or experimented on corpses, he couldn’t tell.”

“The Fleshers made a mess of everything,” Ross added. 

“So when he brought it back you had already left for Tau. I wanted to do something special and with some help from Ross I managed to revive it-him? Her? I just injected the Structure Gel today. I haven’t named them yet. Yeah. That’s actually all there is. The process was a struggle.” Simon scratched the dog’s one good ear. 

“I-I don’t know what to say. I’m proud and shocked you would do something just for me. Then again you managed to fix the Omnitool with no experience and a man from out of time. Thank you!” The dog tried to sit but one its legs gave out. Catherine picked it up and brought it to the lab to put it back together with Ross and Simon following. 

“What should we name it?” Simon asked her. 

“Herber,” Ross suggested. 

“Reed?” Simon threw in. 

Catherine had a better idea. “Ashley. We’ll name her Ashley.”

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_Stay safe during this pandemic wherever you are and thanks for reading the late Valentines’ Special!_

_See you on the Ark,_

_Fall_

**Author's Note:**

> Did you like it? Let me know and review my work! I love this series and will bring it back from the dead if I have to!


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